


Reforged

by ilyena_sylph, Merfilly



Series: For Family [11]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Thrawn Trilogy - Timothy Zahn, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Medical Procedures, Serious Injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-13
Updated: 2016-07-13
Packaged: 2018-07-23 16:38:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7471176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ilyena_sylph/pseuds/ilyena_sylph, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vader experiences a change at the most basic levels, before the small family moves out to find one more of their own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reforged

The minute the med droids moved back and allowed her (in her sterile suit and and respirator) to come to the bed, Ahsoka questioned just how they had ever come to this point. She had seen the damage when she helped him that first time, delivering the pain medicine.

It hadn't really sank in until now, as she saw what it took to properly prep him for being completely stripped of his suit. The prosthetic limbs were bad enough; only the original one looked anywhere near 'right' to her eyes. However, the procedures they were doing would upgrade those as well.

No, it was how many life-support machines had to be brought in, taking over nearly every major function of the human body. Only his brain seemed to have escaped the damage… and that, Palpatine had scarred and wrecked so easily, taking advantage of Anakin's fears.

"Synth skin, reconstruction, new limbs, the best in biomech organs," she whispered, promising these things to him with a sick, twisting anger in her guts to see him so badly destroyed. He'd been one of the most handsome humans, physically strong even without Force ability, and dashing in how he dressed himself. That was the shallow side of the loss.

The more destructive parts were that his injuries had made him a slave to technology and having adequate technical help on hand. The worst was that it had taken away his ability to touch, and anyone who didn't think Anakin Skywalker needed physical solace was absolutely out of their skull. It hadn't taken long for him to warm to her hugs or her sudden grabs of his hand. He'd been the first person she had fallen asleep on during campaigns.

And she'd seen more than a few stolen embraces between him and the Senator, with him holding on as if she would vanish into thin air. His constant habit of resting a hand on Artoo, or clasping Rex's shoulder in passing, petting her between the montrals when she did well… all of these things he had completely lost.

She rested her knuckles on bare skin beside the ventilator. "I'm going to make this better, somehow, _ori'vod_ ," she whispered.

One of the med-droids beeped warningly at her, hovering close on its tethers, and she glared at it. "You decontaminated the whole thing before I came in here, I'm as safe as you are for him. Now stop fussing at me and help him." 

She was certainly going to. With him lulled and drugged into actual oblivion, she could do some of the Force Healing his body so badly needed. She could manage that even through the protective suit, with her _ori'vod_. He couldn't go into hibernation trance, or the powerful healing trance, with the machines making his body have normal human rhythms, but she could work for him. 

She sank herself into his body, looking for damage she could help... and everywhere her sense touched, she felt death. Tiny pockets of dead flesh, mostly skin, but some deep inside, pouring toxins into his body. 

No. Not with her here. This could be beaten, would be beaten. She was a warrior, not a healer... but this -- this was war, too. 

She could not, would not lose her _ori'vod_ again. She'd left, for herself, and he'd been lost. She'd come back to him, a promise made in the midst of a fight that he had enforced on her in what she now saw as a merciful way of eliminating her threat without killing her. She set her entire will into healing, into seeking out the death within him, to eliminate it. She might have doubted her ability had she not saved her own love from speeding to death through age.

There was no doubt, though, only conviction that her _ori'vod_ could have a better life than the shell of a man she had found inside that suit. Her Force raged through him, seeking the taint, and bringing new life in its wake.

++++

Vader came to himself in… much reduced pain. He felt lighter, less confined, and more aware of the touch of the Force along his body. That was unusual, but the lack of crushing pain was the largest part of the change, and he almost gasped.

He was glad he had not, as he felt the curled body of his _ner'vod_ at his side, burrowed under the original prosthetic arm, a tight little ball of exhaustion who nonetheless stirred at him being awake. 

"S'posed t'be resting still," she muttered, her voice filtered by her respirator, showing they were in the sterile chamber. "Why 'wake?" 

"I felt… different." He twitched his hand, noting it was fully functional and bare, so he moved it to rest more on her back, waiting for her protest if the metal bothered her. The ventilator was gone, as the oxygen-rich, pressurized air supported him adequately, but there were other machines, assisting him. "There is so little pain now," he admitted.

"Good," she murmured, still sleepy but waking, as his right hand rested on her. He'd always had pretty good sensitivity in it... and at least she could give him that much touch. "I think I _finally_ found all the pockets of dead stuff and got rid of them -- the dialysis machine didn't like me very much -- so that should help. 

"And the surgical team called in a couple of pain specialists to come up with something better than that kriffing _poison_ they were using as a painkiller for you!" She forced herself to calm down, to settle, to be pleased with the progress they had made instead of raging at his past torture. "So that should help, too. I'm just going to apologize now for the bill on how many sparring droids I am _going_ to destroy, once I have the time, since I can't kill people that are already dead." 

"Hmm," he rumbled, mind turning again around the one he suspected was not dead, swirling with dark thoughts and wishes to inflict more suffering on that one. "I destroyed the original med droids, but the author of this all… he still lives, I am certain." That she had done so much for him… he couldn't dwell on that.

"What?" she asked, startled, lifting her head to blink down at the chalk-pale skin and solid yellow eyes -- there had still been little that could be done for his damaged eyes, to her rage, even with her best and most desperate attempts at coaxing the Force to help him -- of her _ori'vod_. "But we killed the Emperor, together." 

Vader gave her a tight, weak smile that conveyed betrayal, malice, and his love for her… an odd mix, but the Force impression was strong. "The Emperor did not inflict these injuries upon me, _ner'vod_. He merely took advantage of them when he pulled me from Mustafar's flames."

He could still smell the gasses, the heat, hear the roar of the magma and the destruction all around him. The raking fire along his skin, the burn within his lungs, he would never forget those either. Nor would he ever forget that despite Obi-Wan's skill, the Jedi had crippled him and left him to die a tortured death.

"That was Kenobi."

'Merely took advantage of, _my left lekku_ ,' Ahsoka thought, possibly sharply enough that he could hear it, her lips pulling back from her teeth under the respirator. At least a third of the damage that had been left on her Skyguy was _deliberately_ left! Her senses were overwhelmed for a moment with what her _ori'vod_ had felt, her body trying to pull itself into a tight, defensive curl... but he was speaking, and...

For a moment, two, three, she thought he'd somehow lapsed into Huttese or another of the languages he spoke, because the syllables made no sense in Basic. 'That was Kenobi.' Flat, slow, thoughts of inflicting agonizing pain riding the words as he spoke them.... 

"What?" she finally managed to ask, confused and horrified.

"Kenobi used my Angel to find me, coming to where I was on Mustafar on _her_ ship. He interfered with me talking to her… and I did not take it well, I admit. We fought, and his noble Jedi self decided to cripple me, to leave me lying on the banks of a magma flow to die slowly!" Vader told her with hatred and loathing in his words. "He had the nerve to tell me not to try to get the better ground, when I had no choice, Ahsoka… and then he failed to take a clean blow! It was agony, so much agony!

"And he taunted me with saying he loved me! That I had been his brother! Yet he left me there! BURNING!"

She listened, watching his mobile face twist with the rage that poured from him in the Force, the twisted, tainted power of the Dark Side surging through their bond, trying to get a grip in her chest, her heart -- 

\-- and for a few moments, as she listened to the litany of what had been done to her _ori'vod_ , the center of her _aliit_ , it came close to winning. She hissed her fury, thinking of the precision of the cuts that had taken her brother's legs, his left arm. Those -- those could be lightsaber blows, and Obi-Wan was fast and strong enough to manage the dismembering Mark, but to **do** it -- 

And then to _leave_ him?!?!?! 

Inside the gloves, her hands flexed, a snarl rippling in her throat that she did not try to stop. 

His hand closed on her shoulder, holding her close to his side as he struggled to find control; he could not take her down this road. Ahsoka… was the middle ground. The path that had eluded them all, neither Dark nor Light.

The clarity of that realization washed through him with a sobering effect, and he forced his labored lungs to find a careful pattern.

" _Ner'vod_ , my anger… it is not yours. Do not let it poison you."

Feeling him -- _him!_ \-- struggling for calm in the midst of all of his rage, hearing him call to her to let go of her fury... it was like an entire ocean of cold water being dumped on her, and she shook as though she could throw it off, growling her frustration. 

"What," she asked, acid in her words, "I don't get to be angry that a man I respected almost as much as I love you _tortured you_?!" 

He turned his head to be more able to see her. "Angry, yes. Letting it fill you? No, little 'Soka… no. Don't let his mistakes, and mine, lead you down the wrong path." His eyes were trying so hard to focus on her features, his hand remaining wrapped around her. "You were right to leave the Order, and what you have done for me since I woke you shows me why. You do not deal in absolutes, and you can see the shadows without falling into them. That, _ner'vod_ , is a comfort to me."

She growled, but his words were steadying, soothing. She nodded slowly, breathing in and out, trying to steady herself so that she wouldn't push him further. For him, to keep him from being stupid and pushing her away to protect her, she could control herself. She _would_ control herself... she had to. "Okay," she grumbled, her eyes still narrowed, her nails flexing inside the gloves. "I... I will calm down. I will.

"But seriously, your droids are going to be in _pieces_." 

"Just try to detach them at easily soldered points?" he asked, while understanding that perfectly. "Make it a good exhibition, Ahsoka. I think everyone could stand to be reminded of what a Force user looks like in action."

He laid his head back, closing his eyes as he felt so tired, with his rage melting away from him. "I think I should sleep again," he added. It would be easy to fall asleep without all the pain.

"I'll try," she agreed, even as she purred quietly at the permission and encouragement, and she found an open bit of undamaged skin to pet gently. "You should, _ori'vod_. You need it. I think I'll go check in with the Noghri, make sure they're alright, but then I'll be right back, okay? One of them is right outside, too." 

"mmm," he murmured, letting his fatigue win, even as he relaxed his hold on her as encouragement to leave his side. She would be back… and he could feel her all through his mind, an anchor to hold him where he wished to be.

++++

As good as it had been to get the errand out of the way, Vader felt real relief to get back to Coruscant on schedule. He felt a pressing need to check with Leia, to see if the dreams had changed, so that he would be forewarned. 

He almost just left Ahsoka aboard the _Exactor_ , given that they would be leaving within a day of arrival, but recognized that as lingering jealousy over someone else mattering so much in her life. He had piloted them down, leaving her to contact Leia.

"Senator Organa, are you at the Embassy or the Tower?" Ahsoka asked once the young woman, or Winter, had answered. Their voices over wrist comm were difficult for her to distinguish.

"The Embassy," came an easy answer, though her voice was suddenly threaded with urgency, "and good afternoon, Ahsoka. We'll meet you at the landing pad?" 

They were back, Leia thought, her head almost spinning with relief. Wherever they had disappeared to, they were back now, and they could go get her brother. 

She'd been dreaming about him more often, since that first one. 

"Yes, please." Ahsoka's lekku wriggled slightly in anticipation, the colors growing more bold as she considered that Leia would fully occupy Vader's time and she could easily --

"Shields, _ner'vod_!" Vader said, half-wry, half-amused.

She grumbled at him, but did shield better, before she thought to wonder why Leia was planning to meet them. Perhaps she thought Vader would want to take her back to his Tower, rather than stay there for any period of time? 

Leia moved to pick up her bag and gather up Artoo and her Noghri -- she might even get used to them sometime this decade. Winter was going to stay here, but she thought if she kept Rex from Ahsoka there might be bloodshed, and besides, he almost never left her. She could make the platform before the ship did, she was almost entirely certain. 

Vader set the ship down on the platform with perfect skill, not even getting a rock-back as the legs all touched together. Ahsoka was already moving to disembark, eager to greet that one human-tall male presence she had noticed through the viewscreen, standing just in shadow but able to see the entire landing pad.

"Ahsoka, we will be leaving again," Vader called to her, shielding himself against the crumple of emotions before she pulled herself together. "Tell him to come aboard; you can introduce him to Kilo."

That had to be the most confusing order ever; why were they leaving again? So soon? With Leia?

And... what? What? He wanted... "You're a _jerk_ , _ori'vod_ ," she growled at him, balling up a fist and waving it in his direction before she ran off the shuttle -- jumping down from the half-dropped ramp -- towards her husband, remembering to at least wave towards Leia. 

Leia blinked, startled at seeing Ahsoka show her relationship so obviously, when Vader had to be able to see, before she shook it off and hugged Winter goodbye. 

Winter hugged her foster-sister and friend hard and long, before sighing. "Please be safe, Leia. I will worry the whole time you are gone."

Rex was just as stunned as Leia; he'd stood back, hoping it would be enough, but his wife was wrapping around him and he couldn't think much past that, or the kiss that stole his breath away. When she did let him breathe, he could take in the vibrant blue of the lekku, her general state of being, and then he knew things had to be better. 

"I take it you missed me," Rex teased lightly.

"Terribly," Ahsoka agreed, kissing him again. "No one shipboard except _ori'vod_ can even half keep up with me in a ring, and even once I convinced the brothers it was acceptable now to play Tackle again, before we were halfway home they'd decided I was just too much of an advantage for any team!" She grumbled sulkily, before she smiled up at him. "And it... things are... better, now. Come on. He wants to see you."

"Of course I'll be safe," Leia told her friend, stroking Winter's hair for a moment. "I'll have an entire Star Destroyer worth of protection, plus the Noghri. And don't worry, you'll get wrinkles." 

Winter had to laugh at that, before kissing Leia, chastely, on the cheek. "Go, find your brother, bring him home," she said warmly.

Rex took a deep breath, but nodded; he could kit up from stores on ship, and already had his personal weapons on him. "If you say so, _riduur_ ," he said, following her lead, and going with her into the presence of the man that had once been the rock foundation on which his loyalty had rested.

Vader did not move from the pilot's seat, flicking a quiet //Leia// at both his daughter and his friend, to make it clear who he wanted to come forward. While he was prepared to deal with Rex, even Artoo who had followed Leia and the Noghri, right now he wished to have his daughter at his side.

"...or he could want to see his daughter first," Ahsoka said as she got that information, rolling her eyes as she tugged him off to one of the side benches to tuck herself against him. "Well. I'm not going to protest time with you first," she added, pleased, if a little exasperated. 

Leia followed that call, still unsettled at that she _could_ hear him whenever he wanted her to, and slipped into the forward cabin. She looked for black, didn't see it... and all of her aplomb deserted her to see such a different figure where she had expected Vader's never-changing obsidian-dark exosuit. 

Gray met her eyes instead, from helm to boots, but it was a deep, rich, blue-tinged shade. Different hues, in some places, and... a vivid orange-red in almost delicate designs ran along the gauntlets and the boots. The chest-plate had been redesigned, looked a little less as though it was the life-support she knew it was. It was still sealed to a full-face, multiple-section mask... but this one was less terrifyingly shaped, and she thought it might even move somewhat. 

"I -- Lord Va -- " 

"Don't, Leia," came a much, much different voice. Firm still, utterly confident, but much warmer, and... more human. She could barely hear the rebreather at all. "I'm still working on figuring out a name for me, now, but you don't need to use a title with me." 

"...just Vader, then, for now?" she asked, still dizzied by the change. "This -- this is what you disappeared for. To -- " 

"To move along the new path of healing, of finding myself," he told her. "The Empire is dying as we find each resistant Admiral and Moff. It was time to become someone truer to the man I wish to be, and I had Ahsoka to guard the transition." With Leia, he would be as close to honest as he could be. "Your brother, is he still safe?"

She nodded, studying him a little more. That 'the man I wish to be' made her chest ache, and she moved closer, resting her hand on one shoulder carefully. "He's fine... bored, and making calf-eyes at a girl that can't decide which of his friends or him she wants, but fine. 

"He likes flying things far faster than they ought to go, though!" That had had her heart in her mouth even when she woke!

Vader surprised her with a laugh that sounded far more human than not, even as he touched the controls to take off again. "That is something he gets honestly then, Leia. There was a time when I was considered the best pilot on the galaxy. I just hope he's not pod-racing." They would still have to let the _Exactor_ manage resupply and there were a few Fleet details his Captain was handling for him, but there was no point in not returning to the ship, giving his daughter time to acclimatize to the vessel before they left orbit the next planetary day.

He'd laughed. 

Leia's knees went weak, and she sank carefully down into the co-pilot's seat, staring out at the Coruscant traffic with a slight shake of her head. "Pod-racing?" she asked, rather than say the 'you _have_ changed' aloud. It was probably obvious anyway.

Vader's amusement continued to ripple through her, and back in the rear of the craft Ahsoka was thunking her head against Rex's breastplate at _ori'vod_ and his inability to be anything less than shocking, even when it was good.

"A very dangerous sport. As far as I know, I am the only human to ever win a major event in it. When I was nine." He could taste the pride of that memory, an uncomplicated moment as long as he didn't think about the effect it had rolled across his life and his mother's. "Two to four engines, coupled and sometimes cross-coupled, pulling a small pod with a pilot, across tracks that were invariably full of pitfalls, obstacles, and sometimes deliberate traps."

Leia shook her head, feeling the flicker of that uncomplicated pride and satisfaction with interest and an odd flare of affection. This was not the man she had first met, at all... and she thought she might come to like him, where she had mostly feared Darth Vader. "And you -- at _nine_?! That's... well, it sounds interesting, anyway? I don't think it's made it to Alderaan. How long a course?" 

"It varied. Given an average of sixteen minutes to do a three lap race, when speeds could reach nine hundred k.p.h?" He gave a negligent shrug of his shoulder, a movement she could actually discern in the new suit. "It's outlawed inside the Empire… New Republic. But I know it probably never died out on Tatooine."

"Nine hun -- on the _surface?!_ " Leia yelped, knew it, and shook her head, raking her fingers through her hair and contemplating what kind of lunatic would let a child anywhere near that kind of speed or that kind of danger -- and then remembered that the man beside her had been a slave. Her mouth tightened and her eyes narrowed slightly, before she put the surge of anger away. "Know what, never mind. No, I didn't see him in anything like _that_." 

Not that that necessarily meant anything, she hadn't dreamed of him every night, or even most. 

"Good. It's known to be slightly deadly," he said, deadpan, not letting his amusement leak into it for that little yelp. She looked and sounded so much like Padmé, and he knew he had made the right choices since Vorkhiron had told him about her. "Other than lust woes, is there any detail that stands out that may pose a problem?"

He'd said that just to make her yelp, she was sure of it. Leia thought about the question for a bit, quiet, then shook her head. "Not really? I mean, he already wants to leave, but his aunt and uncle don't want him to? Or can't afford for him to. His uncle was fighting -- arguing, loudly -- with someone that wanted to take him away."

Anger flared in that moment, as Vader knew there was one person who might try and steal his son again before he could get to him. "We will reach the boy. You will have your brother, Leia," he said fiercely.

Ahsoka slid out of Rex's lap and headed forward, fast. She found herself a portion of open paneling to perch on, her back to the viewscreen as she stared at her elder brother. " _Ori'vod_? What is it, what's wrong? I wasn't listening..." 

That fury had roiled over her and Leia had gone momentarily quiet in the face of it, looking for words -- and then Ahsoka was there.

"Kenobi. I feel he may be interfering with our path again, _ner'vod_ ," he told her, using Leia's sudden quiet and tightly shielded presence and Ahsoka's appearance as anchors to pull free of his rage. "We are going to Tatooine."

Leia looked at the Togruta. "I have had dreams, Lady Tano. Of a boy, my age, on a desert world," she explained. "Vader said they are Force visions, and he… we think he's my brother." She had not wanted to contact her father, to ask him. She was afraid he'd tell her no, when the boy's loneliness kept pulling at her.

Ahsoka stared at her for a moment, then swung her eyes back towards her _ori'vod_ , tapping her nails on her thigh. "You couldn't have, _maybe_ , possibly, mentioned this before?" 

She looked so like an offended lothcat -- her perch on the console not helping at all with that impression -- that Leia had to bite her lip to keep from laughing, which helped Vader as much as Ahsoka's outburst.

"I would have told you eventually. We've been busy," he said, all too aware he sounded like Anakin with those words.

"We've been in hyperspace for the last hundred hours!" she protested, very well aware that she sounded incredibly like the girl she hadn't been in a very long time, like 'Snips', padawan to the 'Skyguy and Kenobi' dream team. "And neither one of us spent that much time asleep! Ooooh!" 

"Go be wifely at your husband," he said dismissively, but there was a smile in his voice. "I'm in control," he added more seriously. He would not be denied access to Padmé's son, even if it meant letting vengeance slide -- until he had put both children back under the protection of Ahsoka, on Coruscant. Then he would take up his hunt.

She purred at him, tempted to lick her lips just to show how much she was looking forward to that, and only vaguely decided better of it. "Mmm, we're almost to the _Exactor_ , I'll wait until we're settled -- oh, _kriff_ , I've been -- But -- 

"You had better have planned on quarters for us when you decided you were bringing my husband along, _ori'vod_ , unless you **want** us on your couch..." 

"The state cabin nearest mine is yours," he told her, rippling dismay at her for even thinking of using the couch in his chambers that way. "The other one will be Leia's," he added. If -- when -- he acquired the boy, he would have to determine better arrangements for them all, unless the siblings were willing to share the cabin suite. 

Leia had found this entire thing incredibly entertaining... but now, with Ahsoka looking vaguely like she'd been hit over the back of the head with something heavy, she started giggling despite herself. 

"State cabin," the Togruta woman muttered, departing the console in an idle forward roll that brought her lightly back to her feet without ever using her hands, "state cabin.. Me and..."

Ahsoka disappeared muttering, and Leia glanced at her biological father curiously. "What was that about a couch?" 

"Ahsoka is a Togruta, a clannish people. She does better if she is within earshot of those she claims as her family, clan, unit," Vader said quietly. "So, she lived in my quarters on the couch I installed for her. 

"I'd rather not endure her reunion with her husband at that close a range," he added. 

Her reunion with her -- and she'd said -- Leia found herself flushing and shaking her head. "I -- no, I'm sure I wouldn't, either!" 

She decided to ask Ahsoka her questions about the Jedi Vader blamed for that his children had been brought up away from him, and separated, and that much later. Especially as they really were getting very close to the _Exactor_. 

+++++

Vader watched as Ahsoka took Leia on a tour, the next ship-morning after having settled into their cabins. He had requested the women do so, as it would give him the time he needed to actually see and confront Rex, with all of the complications that meant. Once the women had left his outer chamber, he moved out as well, going to the state cabin he had given his former student.

Rex had known perfectly well, when he heard about the request for Ahsoka to take the Princess around the ship, what was coming. He'd had almost nineteen years to think about what was going to happen the next time that he saw whatever the kriff was left of his General -- and mostly he'd figured that that was going to mean his taking a Sith-red lightsaber straight across the throat. 

That it wasn't, that Ahsoka said there was something _left_ of their General... that he'd never figured on. At all. At the first breath of a hiss from the door, he was on his feet. He'd been figuring out who he was as a person, as a Rebel, for that long -- and there were still some things he just wanted to be on his feet for. 

It wasn't the black that had become so well known, Ahsoka had warned him of that. 

What she hadn't said was that he'd embellished the suit and its armor with what almost looked almost like squad paintings. 

"Rex," Vader said, looking him over head to toe. The age Rex carried…

… if Ahsoka hadn't gotten to him, there was a strong chance Rex would have aged out of ability to serve already, possibly be dead. That thought shouldn't carry such emotional weight, yet it did. That he had Rex to thank for keeping Ahsoka halfway sane was another reason to be relieved at Rex's survival. Even if it had come at the cost of losing most of his brothers.

That sounded like his General's voice, more than any of the broadcasts of Darth Vader. Not... right, not the voice he'd been so glad to hear, so often, but... better than Vader's. He could feel his General's eyes rake over him, and he stood a little straighter, answering the only way he knew how, even now. "Sir. 

"Borrowed my color scheme, sir?" 

Vader gave a sound that might have been a laugh, short as it was. "Ahsoka kept suggesting blues to get away from the black," he admitted. "Speaking of…" His voice dipped toward purposefully intimidating. "I understand you and she are engaged in a relationship."

He wanted to hear how Rex answered that, to judge if this was still the man he had known so well, and therefore worth _his_ former student.

Rex _hated_ it when the General got that tone, and his jaw locked for a moment as he stared into the mask. Not that different from looking at a brother's sun bonnet, really. "I think you mean I'm lucky enough that she didn't throw me out of bed for telling her how I felt, _sir_ , and luckier that she decided to accept." 

That… that fit. That was Ahsoka's blazing independence and Rex's steadfast loyalty melded into something truer than either alone. "Very well, Rex." He let his body relax some. "I have a mission for you, while you are aboard my ship." He waited to see how Rex handled both his tacit approval of the relationship and the offer of something to do.

At least he still knew how to deal with his former general, Rex decided, watching the loom subside, the body language relax out of perfect stiffness into something calmer, and he had to admit that he breathed a little easier. Dealing with the General in a snit had never been fun. Vader in a snit seemed to tend to end with corpses. He felt himself smile a little at the 'very well'... and then one of his brows cocked. "What do you need of me?" 

He'd see what his answer was going to be once he knew what the mission was. 

"Meet up with Sergeant Kilo. Move among the troops. Help them move forward on being people again. I know there's a lot of recruits among them now, but… they got brainwashed into being what most people wanted you men to be," Vader said. "Ahsoka's started tearing it apart, but you are a legend to them."

If the troops could break down those barriers on his ship, and Vader started shuffling them out, bit by bit, he would have an effective force again, one that actually excelled at hard missions because there was no stigma on rising out of the crowd. That was his pragmatic, power-based reasoning, anyway.

"Reconditioning," Rex murmured. Clones. Droids with brains, interchangeable, expendable, valuable only for their ability to kill. "I know, sir." 

Rex had known what had happened to his brothers, had heard part of it over tapped comms and heard stories of the rest, but hearing the twist of hesitation and pain in his General's voice as he admitted how bad it was, basically admitted that they were going to have to start all over with teaching them how to be individuals, people... now it hurt, like he hadn't let it hurt since he'd left Wolffe and Gregor. "Pretty sure if I'm a legend for anything, sir, it's that I left them when they needed me most. 

"Not exactly the good kind of legend. But if I can help my _vod'e_ , you know I will." 

Vader looked at Rex intently. "No, you're a legend because you escaped before the Order," he admitted. "Possibly hated, in that first year, but then whispered of in meetings. I pretended not to hear it; they kept it from being anywhere official."

It had been a weakness, a piece of Anakin, yet Vader had respected Rex's strength to push on, to take that step that could have been so fatal and get free.

Rex swallowed, shaking his head slightly, his chest hurting. He'd given up any hope of reaching any of his brothers that still bore that kriffing chip almost a decade ago, after an encounter with a group of Imperial Stormtroopers that didn't even speak Mando'a anymore... but if there were some that remembered him, that needed him... "All right, sir. I'll take your word on it, and I'll see what I can do for them." 

"That is all I can ask of you." Vader waited a heartbeat, then finished. "Other than not to fail my _ner'vod_ ," he continued in an almost threatening tone… with an underlying amusement.

"Y'know, sir, I'm pretty sure I ought to be the one telling _you_ that about my _riduur_ ," Rex replied, watching those hands for the microsecond of telltale that might let him throw enough panic at his wife to survive. "All things considered." 

Vader did let his pleasure in that defiant attitude come through. "We understand each other well now." He pushed to go on about his business, planning to prowl the bridge and make his Fleet men nervous.

"Always did get my General," Rex answered, soft. "Nice to get you, too. So. Same configuration as ever, just bigger?" 

"Roughly. Your ident gives you access to anywhere on the ship your wife has access, which is nearly everywhere," Vader said, having already set that up before coming to talk to him. "Ahsoka has explored it more fully than I have; she'll be able to tell you key differences, I have no doubt."

Now _that_ wasn't a kriffing thing like his General, and Rex cast the long drape of steel-gray armor-weave cape a concerned look. "Likely, yeah," he agreed. "See you later, sir."


End file.
